A PRIEST ROOTS FOR MICHIGAN

Philip Hersh, Tribune Olympic Sports WriterCHICAGO TRIBUNE

There is a timeless and otherworldly quality to the Buddhist clergy at Zenkoji Temple as they pad about on sandaled feet in their dark robes, with their shaved heads covered by cowls. Celebrating the religious and cultural glories of a 1,400-year-old shrine almost seems to preclude concerns with contemporary life--even the Winter Olympics, which open here Friday.

When one priest, Taka-Kazu Fukushima, removes his robes to relax at home, he frequently will slip into another of his prized vestments: a Michigan football T-shirt. Even in the ethereal ambience of Zenkoji, the 50-year-old priest was ready to celebrate the once-in-his-lifetime event that took place recently.

Fukushima, who gave up an academic career for the priesthood six years ago, had kept up only occasionally with Michigan football in the two decades since he became a fan during his days as a postdoctoral student in chemical engineering at Ann Arbor. For two years, he attended every home game, and his memories are of Rick Leach, Rose Bowls from the 1970s and old-fashioned Big Ten football.

The name of Michigan's quarterback this past season, Brian Griese, meant nothing to Fukushima. So the priest was asked if he were aware of what had happened in this year's Rose Bowl.

"Oh, yes," he said. "I saw this on television. We are No. 1."

Such expressions of supremacy, the norm for sports fans in the United States, have been frowned upon in Japan in the half-century since the end of World War II. Neither the Japanese flag, with its rising sun on a white background, nor the Japanese national anthem is commonly used.

While Fukushima was impressed by crowds of 100,000-plus cheering and trooping the maize and blue at Michigan Stadium ("I never saw so many people gathered in one place"), he would feel uncomfortable if a similar atmosphere were reproduced in Japan.

"Maybe my father's generation was proud to show the Japanese flag, but we (younger people) would have funny feelings about that because we conquered many Asian countries using that flag," Fukushima said. "We are afraid it might offend people.

"When we had (sports) competitions in school, the students watching would have the flags of many countries. If we choose our own, that reminds us of a bad age. After World War II, Japanese wanted to dilute the greatness of our flag."

There will undoubtedly be Japanese flags waved by those in the crowds of 40,000 or more expected at the ski-jumping events. Such expressions of national pride will be permissable during the 1998 Winter Olympics, even if much of the country is indifferent to winter sports.

"The Winter Games are not so popular in Japan," Fukushima said. "Not so many Japanese are interested in how many gold medals we can win."

Nevertheless, Fukushima said a victory by local hero Kenji Ogiwara, twice an Olympic disappointment in Nordic combined, would mean more to him than Michigan's being No. 1. And the Japanese have spent an estimated $10.5 billion on the Winter Games, much of that going for infrastructure improvements such as highways, a bullet train from Tokyo and an expanded regional airport 35 miles away in Matsumoto.

While Nagano hotels are solidly booked for the Olympics, the same is not true 40 miles away in the ski resort of Hakuba, host site for all the Nordic skiing events and six of the 10 alpine events. Not only are Hakuba hotels begging for Olympic customers, they also have lost many of the recreational skiers who usually go there.

At least Hakuba has no more worries about snow. A downhill course that was bare less than a month ago now has a 7-foot base at the top. Another foot was added Saturday, the seventh straight day snow has fallen there.

"Many schools have chosen other places for their ski trips this winter," Fukushima said. "The hotel owners in Hakuba and Shiga Kogen (site of the remaining alpine events) worry that once people decide to change, they won't go back."